Georg Baselitz

Exhibited by MARUANI MERCIER

Material oil on canvas

Dimensions 300 × 400 cm

Price Available upon inquiry

Status Vetted

About the Work

Painted in 2014, Immer Noch Unterwegs (Still on the Road) operates at the intersection of key themes characteristic of Georg Baselitz’s artistic production of the last decade. Set against a monochrome dark ground, two upright figures reference the composition of Die Grosse Freunde (The Great Friends, 1965), a work of near-iconic significance within Baselitz’s œuvre. Immer Noch Unterwegs thus extends the artist’s Remix Paintings (2005–2014), in which he revisits earlier motifs. Rather than attempting improvement, the Remix series represents an introspective re-engagement with the past. As Baselitz explained to curator Okwui Enwezor: “It’s not a question of making the pictures I’ve already done better… instead, it’s an entirely hermetic preoccupation with myself, with results that should impact the outside.”

Taking Die Grosse Freunde as its point of departure, the present work reflects on Baselitz’s artistic journey. One of the most complex paintings in the landmark Hero series (1965–1966), Die Grosse Freunde depicts human companionship amid the ruins of postwar Germany. The only Hero painting to feature two figures, it projects an unusual sense of hopeful recuperation. As art historian Shulamith Behr observed, “like Latter-day Saints set against apocalyptic ruins, the two figures… show their wounds and gesture towards future collaborative creativity.” For Baselitz, the painting became paradigmatic; in his 1966 manifesto he described it as “an ideal picture… the idée fixe of friendship.”

In Immer Noch Unterwegs, the protagonists retain this sense of amicable interaction. The outstretched arm of the left figure bridges the dark space in a gesture of enduring dialogue. The debris of twentieth-century trauma is removed, allowing a meditation on the present encounter. Rendered in pale tones, the figures appear almost ethereal, suggesting a deeply personal reflection on companionship and lifelong partnership. The double portrait recalls Baselitz’s repeated depictions of himself and his wife, Elke.

Executed with expressive brushwork, the painting oscillates between figuration and abstraction. Dynamic lines defining the figures allude to Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock. A monochrome dark stripe fractures the pictorial space, echoing Baselitz’s signature inversion of the figure. This rupture signals a break from direct representation and socio-political narrative, asserting instead the autonomy of painterly gesture. As curator Norman Rosenthal notes, “Baselitz still has the capacity to shock… succeeding in being both out of his time and profoundly of it.”

First presented publicly in 2019 at the Weimar Kunstfest, Immer Noch Unterwegs was shown in dialogue with a musical performance by Matthias Goerne. Baselitz was the subject of a major retrospective at the Centre Pompidou, Paris, in October 2021. His works are held in major public collections, including Tate, London; The Metropolitan Museum of Art and MoMA, New York; and the Albertina, Vienna.

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